The NCAA has two different signing periods for men's and women's basketball. The first signing period is from November 12-19 and the second signing period is April 15-May 20. There are also a few loopholes around the signing period that every Division One school has an option to use. So let's go over the plusses and minuses off signing during each of the signing periods as well as a few loopholes.
First of all, the National Letter of Intent is what the prospect will sign to lock the prospect to the school for at least the first year of their college career. †his is a legal binding document that gives all the power to the school the prospect signs to. If the prospect hasn't decided where to go until the signing period, then he/she could get several LOI's from each of the schools he/she is considering. It is the prospect's job to send the LOI to the school that they choose. Once it is faxed, the school can report the signing but it isn't official until the school receives the document via the mail.
Fall Signing Period
I believe this period is for any prospect that truly is locked into the school they picked. They have done enough unofficial and official (only get five) visits to have a great understanding of what they are looking for in a school and basketball program as well as a great understanding of the coach at the institution. A lot of prospects will commit at this time because they are truly burned out by the recruiting process at this point and just want to focus on their high school basketball season.
This is also a time to sign when programs have received verbal commitments and all of the prospects' offers have now been given to someone else. Coaches have the tendency to offer numerous prospects at the same position and will give the "first come, first serve" to regards to who gets them. Issues with this arise when the prospect doesn't have as many offers as they originally thought.
There is also a reverse recruitment to what I said above. When a school realizes they don't have a chance to a prospect they will then quickly see if another prospect that plays the same position would have an interest. The the Spring Signing Period is a lot like this and I'll talk about it more later.
Here is a prospect that learned about this process. "Tum Tum" Nairs is a prospect that signed with Michigan State. The only reason he signed with Michigan State was because Coach Izzo thought he had a great shot with Tyus Jones (who signed with Duke) and then he thought he had a great shot with Tyler Ulis (who signed with Kentucky). "Tum Tum" had taken numerous visits before Michigan State even became interested.
I really think that signing in the Fall brings huge stability to a lot of things and is great when the prospect falls in love with the school (not some co-ed they met on the visit).
Spring Signing Period
I truly believe that this is the best period to sign in. Why? There are too many questions during the Fall Signing Period. What will the roster truly look like? Who will be the head coach? Who will be the assistant coaches?
There were 675 transfers this year at the D1 level. That's almost two transfers per school. Some schools have more and some have less. Prospects will have a better understanding of what the next year's depth chart will look like in April/May rather than November.
After the NCAA Tournament ends, there is always a ton of movement with coaches. You have to become keenly aware of that movement and how it affects your decision. Don't you want to play for the head coach that recruited you? What about the assistant that was your main contact throughout the process? It's important to be comfortable at your school and you don't want to be another statistic on the transfer wire. This extra time will also give you a chance to truly watch how the coach interacts with the players as well as get to know the coaches more because you now have more time to.
Another reason why to hold off on signing is that if you hold off, your stock tends to increase throughout the high school season if you played well. Why does your stock increase? There are less scholarships out there and what was considered a low major player now could potentially become a mid to high major player especially if a school struck out on their original targets in the fall period.
Loopholes
One of the biggest loopholes that people don't know about is the Grant In Aid or Financial Aid Papers. This is essentially the Letter of Intent but it binds the school to the prospects instead of the prospect to the school. What that means is that the prospect then has the power rather than the school. Not too many schools will offer this but it happens every once in a whole. Jason Kapono was the first player I ever heard of using it. This is also what transfers use to sign with schools because you can only sing one Letter of Intent.
Here is a perfect example of using the Financial Aid Papers to your advantage brought to you by Kareem Canty, formerly of Marshall University. He decided to transfer after a coaching change at Marshall and originally signed with South Florida and then decided to switch his commitment to Auburn.
D3
There is no Letter of Intent at the D3 level, so if you ever hear about a prospect signing a Letter of Intent, it's a lie. It's basically a deposit to the school. A prospect can actually deposit to several schools as well. A prospect can also get out of a Letter of Intent to a D1 or D2 school by going to a D3 school.
In closing, I don't believe you should sign in the fall unless it's a "dream school" for you. There are just too many question marks to make a decision. The spring period will give a prospect more options.
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